Putin appointed Alexander Dvornikov, a ruthless “Soviet” who believed it was reasonable to kill civilians, as leader of his army.

Russia has named a new commander for its war with Ukraine after suffering severe setbacks in an invasion attempt, a U.S. official said on Sunday. It’s about the general Alexander Dvornikov, 60, one of Russia’s top military officials and, according to U.S. officials, a commander with a reputation for brutality against civilians in Syria and other theaters of war.

The officer who provided the information requested anonymity because he was not authorized to provide that information to the public. Dvornikov is a strategist of the old Soviet schoolconsidered “normal” the losses of civilians during wars.

Dvornikov became known as the “butcher of Syria” after leading Russian forces in 2015. helped dictator Bashar Al-Assad to crush the rebels in a bloody campaign estimated to have claimed the lives of at least 160,000 civilians.

But the White House national security adviser, Jake SullivanHe said that “no appointment of a general can hide the fact that Russia has already suffered a strategic failure in Ukraine.”

“This general is going to be another person responsible crimes and atrocities against Ukrainian civilians” Sullivan told CNN’s “State of the Union.”

“And the United States, as I said before, is determined to do everything possible to help the Ukrainian people fight him and the forces he leads,” Sullivan added. a look at launch an offensive in the eastern region of Ukraineknown as the Donbas.

Dvornikov rose to fame by leading Russian forces in Syria, where Russia has conducted an offensive since 2015 to keep President Bashar Assad in power amid a destructive civil war.

Dvornikov was a career soldier who rose through the armed ranks, starting as a platoon commander in 1982. He fought in second chechen war and held various military positions before being assigned by Russian forces to Syria in 2015. In 2016, Putin decorated Dvornikov with Heroes of Russia medal, one of the highest honors in the country. Dvornikov has been commander of the Southern Military District since 2016.

Sullivan said the general was notorious for acts of atrocities committed against Syria’s civilian population and “sure there will be more like that in this theater of war”. However, he insisted that the US strategy would be the same, to give the Ukrainian forces all the military and logistical assistance they needed.

Until his appointment, Russia has no central commander on land in Ukraine. In Syria, many of the attacks led by Dvornikov targeted vital infrastructure such as hospitals, water sources, schools and markets, according to humanitarian watchdogs. Earlier in his career, he commanded a regiment in second Battle of Grozny in 1999the Russian invasion of the Chechen capital that killed thousands of civilians.